PROOFhttp://proof.nationalgeographic.com
The Stories Behind the PhotographsFri, 31 Jul 2015 16:49:20 +0000en-UShourly1http://wordpress.org/?v=4.2.3The Best of Your Shot: Eight Awesome Animal Photoshttp://proof.nationalgeographic.com/2015/07/31/the-best-of-your-shot-eight-awesome-animal-photos/
http://proof.nationalgeographic.com/2015/07/31/the-best-of-your-shot-eight-awesome-animal-photos/#commentsFri, 31 Jul 2015 14:30:19 +0000http://proof.nationalgeographic.com/?p=23761Every day at National Geographic, our photo editors look through somewhere between 4,000 and 8,000 images that are uploaded to our photo community, Your Shot. Of those images, 12 are selected to shine in what we call the Daily Dozen. And from those photos, only one is chosen. And by chosen, I mean voted on by you, the community. That photo receives the Top Shot honor.

This month, I wanted to feature animal photos that have made Top Shot during July. But not because it’s rare for so many wildlife images to end up in the winning spot. Acutally, it’s the opposite. Wildlife photography is a staple of the Your Shot community. Your Shot editor Marie McGrory says Your Shot is, “a very international community. They travel to see animals all around the world. They spend hours and days waiting for their subject to enter their frame. Like us at National Geographic, they care about animals, animal conservation, and giving a voice to our fellow species.” So feathers or fur, whatever prefer, please enjoy this glimpse into the varied splendor of the animal kingdom. (And don’t forget that you can share your own images with the community by uploading to Your Shot!)

Fox Family Portrait A family of red foxes gathers in Grand Teton National Park. Photographer, Jim Chagares, spent three and a half weeks photoraphing fox dens in Yellowstone and the Grand Tetons. Photograph by Jim Chagares, National Geographic Your Shot

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Monochrome Crocs Two crocodiles cruise around a lake in North Queensland, Australia. Photographer Amy Shire, says she was drawn to the “juxtaposition of the two powerful and menacing creatures framing the delicate nature play above them.” Photograph by Amy Shire, National Geographic Your Shot

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The (Big) Catwalk Sightseers gather at Tadoba Andhari Tiger Reserve in Maharashtra, India to catch a glimpse of this tiger. Photographer Gaurav Kalbhor says this image “shows who is the boss.” Photograph by Gaurav Kalbhor, National Geographic Your Shot

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Full House A female skull spider guards her eggs for a few days after they hatch. After that, the spiderlings are on their own. Photograph by I. Dan, National Geographic Your Shot

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Au Naturel Nap A grizzly rests on a tree in the rain at the Khutzeymateen Grizzly Bear Sanctuary in British Columbia, Canada. Photograph by Michelle Valberg, National Geographic Your Shot

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Monitoring for Lizards A monitor lizard dragon swims through a small lake in Kandy, Sri Lanka. Photographer Michael Haluwana visited the lake four days in a row hoping to catch this moment. This frame was captured after three hours spent sitting in a tree when the lizard finally swam through the waters below. Photograph by Michael Haluwana, National Geographic Your Shot

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Why Hello, Bear! Polar bears congregate on the barrier islands of Kaktovik in northern Alaska every fall to partake in leftovers from Inupiat whaling before the Beaufort Sea freezes and they move on to hunt seal. “It was a surreal experience,” says photographer Laura Keene, “to be in the presence of these magnificent creatures.” Photograph by Laura Keene, National Geographic Your Shot

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See more featured content from Your Shot on our Editors’ Spotlight, and be a part of our photo community—where you can upload images, participate in assignments, and even attend meetups—by joining Your Shot. And don’t forget to help your favorite image from the Daily Dozen become Top Shot by voting every weekday.

]]>http://proof.nationalgeographic.com/2015/07/31/the-best-of-your-shot-eight-awesome-animal-photos/feed/0The Delightfulness of Playgrounds, as Seen From Abovehttp://proof.nationalgeographic.com/2015/07/29/playgrounds/
http://proof.nationalgeographic.com/2015/07/29/playgrounds/#commentsWed, 29 Jul 2015 11:00:57 +0000http://proof.nationalgeographic.com/?p=23720When photographer Stefen Chow was growing up in Singapore, he couldn’t sit still at school.

“I was a very energetic child, and sitting in the classroom and listening to the teacher was not enough for me—I had a lot of energy to expend. I wanted to scream and jump and do everything on the playground,” he says.

Now that he is grown, with a wife and daughter, Chow wanted to pay homage to the spaces that influenced him so much as a child. And he wanted to bring the same sense of surprise and delight to his photographs that playgrounds can bring to a kid.

112 Whampoa Road

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11 Holland Drive

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“As an adventurer, playgrounds played a huge part in my development,” he says. “As you grow up you realize that playgrounds becomes more invisible, and the things in front of you are what you can buy or enjoy. Playgrounds are a place where fun is simple and straightforward, and I wanted to showcase them in a way that makes people say, ‘Huh, I never thought about it in that way before.’”

In order to achieve that sense of wonder, Chow and his wife, Lin Hui-Yi, conceived the idea of The Play Project, which showcases a hundred of Singapore’s playgrounds from the air and locates them on a subway map of the city.

Adventure Playground in Tiong Bahru Park

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60 Marine Terrace

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To make the images, Chow hired an aerial photography company called Avetics to fly drones over playgrounds in Singapore. He scouted locations from an online street directory, then visited more than 200 playgrounds and made more than 300 flights to get the hundred images that ended up on The Play Project’s website.

Avetics specializes in industrial and advertising photography, and for this project they customized a drone to carry Chow’s Nikon Coolpix A compact camera. An Avetics employee would pilot the drone, and Chow would either take the photos while looking at an LCD-type screen, or act as art director while another Avetics employee took the photos.

And even though the images appear to be empty still lifes, Chow says he was looking for moments, even in these seemingly static images. An astute viewer can spot those subtleties—as a car makes a turn around a curve or trains pass each other on opposite tracks.

Stagmont Park (785 Choa Chu Kang Drive)

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Tembusu Park

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According to Chow, there are more than a thousand playgrounds in Singapore, so this project wasn’t meant to be a complete survey. Instead, the project honors urban design, landscape architecture, and the pure aesthetics of the simple play space.

“My personal work has always been to get people to assume they know about something, and then realize they were wrong, or understand something deeper,” says Chow.

“What we discovered is that people in Singapore assumed that playgrounds have disappeared. But in fact they are still very alive and well—the children all know where they are, but as adults, you can’t see them.”

Stefen Chow is a landscape and portrait photographer based in Beijing. To see more of his work, visit his website, and follow him on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter.

This project was funded in part by SG50—a nationwide effort to celebrate Singapore’s 50th anniversary in 2015.

]]>http://proof.nationalgeographic.com/2015/07/29/playgrounds/feed/5A Mother’s Legacy of Art, Icebergs, and Inspirationhttp://proof.nationalgeographic.com/2015/07/28/a-mothers-legacy-of-art-icebergs-and-inspiration/
http://proof.nationalgeographic.com/2015/07/28/a-mothers-legacy-of-art-icebergs-and-inspiration/#commentsTue, 28 Jul 2015 11:05:00 +0000http://proof.nationalgeographic.com/?p=23679When I first saw Zaria Forman’s work, I thought I was looking at a photograph. Instead I discovered that these incredibly detailed images are actually hyperrealist pastel drawings. They depict places that are profoundly affected by climate change—Antarctica, Greenland, and the Maldives. Her renderings of ice, waves, and water are astonishingly tangible and compelling. I discovered Forman’s work in a short film called “Perspective.” It had just the right characteristics that I look for when curating National Geographic’s Short Film Showcase.

This film presents a beautiful portrayal of Forman’s vision and her relationship to her mother, photographer Rena Bass Forman. The elder Forman photographed the Arctic from 2001 until her untimely death in 2011. I corresponded with the younger Forman over email about her art, the Arctic, and the ways that her work is influenced by her mother’s photography.Greenland #10, Ilulissat, 2007Photograph by Rena Bass Forman

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Greenland #72Drawing by Zaria Forman

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RACHEL LINK: Can you tell me a little bit about your mother?

ZARIA FORMAN: My mother dedicated her life to photographing the most remote regions of the Earth. The cold and isolated landscape of the Arctic consumed her interest from 2001 until her passing in 2011. She always said that she was a polar bear in a past life, and watching her spend endless hours in the frigid winds, patiently and happily waiting for the moment when the light was right, gave me no doubts that this was true!

She taught me the importance of loving what you do and carrying out projects full force, no matter what obstacles lay in the way. She created her own series of journeys entitled “Chasing the Light,” and the Greenlandic expedition would have been the third in the trilogy. Her work from her Arctic trips have been compared to [the work of] 19th-century photographers John L. Dunmore and George Critcherson, who were on American painter William Bradford’s 1869 expedition to Greenland. She was inspired by Bradford’s journey and did extensive research, even finding glass plate negatives from the trip by Dunmore and Critcherson.Greenland #1, Ilulissat, 2007Photograph by Rena Bass Forman

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Greenland #71Drawing by Zaria Forman

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RACHEL: When did she start photographing icebergs?

ZARIA: Her first encounter with icebergs was in Patagonia, Argentina, in 2001. Usually we traveled as a whole family, but during that particular adventure I was in my first year of college and couldn’t afford the time off. I believe her obsession with cold, icy landscapes was born on that trip.

RACHEL: Can you talk about the trip you took to Greenland to spread her ashes?

ZARIA: In August of 2012 I led an Arctic expedition up the northwest coast of Greenland. In 1869 William Bradford embarked on the very first Arctic art expedition, and our trip followed his path to find inspiration in the dramatic geography, as he had. We compared exact locations with photographs from Bradford’s trip, discovering both similarities and differences in the landscape almost 150 years later.

My mother had conceived the idea for the voyage but did not live to see it through. She was diagnosed with brain cancer on Mother’s Day in 2011 and passed away six months later. During the months of her illness her dedication to the expedition never wavered, and I promised to carry out her final journey. In Greenland, I was compelled to address the concept of saying goodbye on scales both global and personal as I scattered my mother’s ashes amidst the melting ice.Svalbard #10, Reindeer, Bjorn Dalen Valley, Svalbard. Svalbard lost 50 percent of its reindeer in 2010. This couple was lucky to survive (2010).Photograph by Rena Bass Forman

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Maldives #14Drawing by Zaria Forman

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RACHEL: How does she continue to inspire the work you do?

ZARIA: Fulfilling my mother’s dream to follow Bradford’s voyage in Greenland was one of the most meaningful gifts my mother gave me.

Her sickness and passing was by far the most challenging experience of my life. I had never before faced such a tremendous loss. The mourning process I went through (and continue to go through) shaped and paralleled the concept of the trip to Greenland, which in turn had significant effects on my art. I often thumb through my mother’s negatives and contact sheets from the trips we took together, to find inspiration for my drawings.

Above all though, her dedication, passion, and perseverance continue to inspire me. She would spend hours on an icy cliff edge, waiting for the sunlight to illuminate the frame through [the] camera lens that she had chosen, smiling and happy, long after the rest of the family’s toes had gone numb. We would whine and complain, urging her to call it a day so we could return indoors and have a warm meal. She wouldn’t budge until she knew she had captured what she wanted.Greenland #7, Ilulissat, 2009Photograph by Rena Bass Forman

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Svalbard #33Drawing by Zaria Forman

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RACHEL: Could you explain your artistic process?

ZARIA: I have always preferred soft pastels over the myriad materials I have experimented with. The process of drawing with pastels is simple and straightforward: cut the paper, make the marks. The material demands a minimalistic approach, as there isn’t much room for error or reworking, since the paper’s tooth can hold only a few thin layers of pigment.

I rarely use an eraser—I prefer to work with my “mistakes,” enjoying the challenge of resolving them with limited marks. I love the simplicity of the process, and it has taught me a great deal about letting go. I become easily lost in tiny details, and if the pastel and paper did not provide limitations, I fear I would never know when to stop, or when a composition were complete!

When I travel, I take thousands of photographs. I often make a few small sketches on-site to get a feel for the landscape. Once I return to the studio, I draw from my memory of the experience, as well as from the photographs, to create large-scale compositions. Occasionally I will reinvent the water or sky, alter the shape of the ice, or mix and match a few different images to create the composition I envision. I begin with a very simple pencil sketch, so I have a few major lines to follow, and then I add layers of pigment onto the paper, smudging everything with my palms and fingers and breaking the pastel into sharp shards to render finer details.Greenland #8, Ilulissat, 2007Photograph by Rena Bass Forman

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Lemaire Channel, AntarcticaDrawing by Zaria Forman

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RACHEL: What do you hope people will take away from the art you create?

ZARIA: Artists play a critical role in communicating climate change, which is, I think, the most important challenge we face as a global community. I have dedicated my career to translating and illuminating scientists’ warnings and statistics into an accessible medium that people can connect with, on a level that is perhaps deeper than scientific facts can penetrate. Neuroscience tells us that humans take action and make decisions based on emotion above all else. Studies have shown that art—in particular drawings, paintings, photographs, and film—can impact viewers’ emotions more effectively than an essay or newspaper article.

My drawings explore moments of transition, turbulence, and tranquility in the landscape, allowing viewers to emotionally connect with a place they may never have the chance to visit. I choose to convey the beauty, as opposed to the devastation, of threatened places. If people can experience the sublimity of these landscapes, perhaps they will be inspired to protect and preserve them.

]]>http://proof.nationalgeographic.com/2015/07/28/a-mothers-legacy-of-art-icebergs-and-inspiration/feed/6A Photographer Shares LGBT Stories of Love and Discriminationhttp://proof.nationalgeographic.com/2015/07/27/hammond/
http://proof.nationalgeographic.com/2015/07/27/hammond/#commentsMon, 27 Jul 2015 13:05:22 +0000http://proof.nationalgeographic.com/?p=23636Photographer Robin Hammond has spent his career documenting human rights issues. His recent project, “Where Love is Illegal,” takes an in-depth look at abuse and intolerance faced by LGBTQI (lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer, and intersex) people in seven countries. I asked him via email about the collaborative portraits and stories he created with 65 people who experienced discrimination and persecution.Lesbian couple “O,” 27 (right), and “D,” 23 (left). They were attacked on the way home from a concert after kissing at their subway stop. “The real fear I experienced was not for myself, it was for the one I love,” said O. St. Petersburg, Russia. November 2014. Read more of O and D’s story here.

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COBURN DUKEHART: Why was it important to you to tell the stories of LGBTQI people? What was your personal motivation for the project?

ROBIN HAMMOND: I’ve spent most of the last ten years in Africa. Homosexuality, I always knew, was frowned upon, but it went from a subject rarely talked about to, in my mind, a very hot and hostile issue. It wasn’t just a bunch of extremists though. Africans who I considered my good friends were not shy about letting me know how “evil” gays were—how if they ever met one, they would beat them.

I travel extensively and often come across views I don’t hold, and I have to do my best to put myself in the shoes of others. But I found these statements from intelligent people who I liked very hard to stomach.

My projects often come from an experience or a view of an injustice, something that makes me angry. It became vital to me to tell these stories—the ones that had not yet been told.

Ruslan Savolaynen, 25, is a survivor of multiple homophobic attacks. The many assaults have resulted in a brain injury, memory loss, retinal detachment, and a broken leg. He now has frequent headaches and nosebleeds, and doctors fear he has had a cerebral hemorrhage. St. Petersburg, Russia. November 2014. Read more of Ruslan’s story here.

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COBURN: How did you meet the people you photographed? Was gaining access to their private lives difficult?

ROBIN: I did this work in seven different countries with people of 15 nationalities. Usually I’d work with a local LGBTQI nongovernmental organization. Finding people willing to talk was sometimes a little hard, but, sadly, uncovering stories of discrimination, once I’d found an organization, was very easy.

I can’t express the misery some of these people have lived. Of course, I was lucky not to have to; they did that themselves.

Milli, 35, South Africa. In April 2010 Milli went to stay with a friend. The landlord strangled her with a wire. He shouted, “You think you are a man! I’m going to make you pregnant and I’m going to kill you.” He then raped her for hours. He was arrested, but he was released on $40 bail and didn’t appear in court. He was eventually tracked down a year later. Read more of Milli’s story here.

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For some, though, it was too much. Milli told me of the “corrective rape” she survived, but couldn’t bring herself to write about it. She simply wrote:

“I don’t want to write.
Because I don’t want
To Remember, it makes
Me very angry. But most
Importantly, I want to
Move Forward”

I was deeply, deeply touched by the experience of hearing these 65 stories. I will remember them all, always.

Tiwonge Chimbalanga from Malawi. In 2009 Tiwonge and her husband Steven were arrested and charged with buggery and indecent practices between males. They were sentenced to 14 years in prison. The case caused an international outcry and both were later pardoned on the condition that they never see each other again. Fearing for her safety, Tiwonge fled to South Africa. Read more of Tiwonge’s story here.

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COBURN: Tell me about the portrait sessions. What was your process?

ROBIN: I asked that each person tell me their story of survival and write something about themselves. The intention was that these testimonies would inform the construction of the portrait—how they dressed, posed, etc.

It was a collaboration unlike any other I’ve been involved in. I would ask them how they would like to be seen. How they would like to stand.

It was a risk and sometimes led to unexpected results. So much of the discourse about LGBT rights has been about members of the LGBT population, but not from them. I wanted to give people the chance to say what they wanted to say and be seen how they wanted to be seen. This didn’t always line up with my own expectations.

Jessie, 24, is a transgender Palestinian woman born in a refugee camp in Lebanon. She was born male, but knew she was female from a young age. Her uncle repeatedly raped her, and her father and brother have attacked and tried to kill her multiple times. Unable to complete her training as a nurse due to discrimination, she has resorted to doing sex work.Read more of Jessie’s story here.

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For example, Jessie is a transgender woman from a Palestinian refugee camp in Lebanon. She has been thrown out of school [and] attacked by her father and brother. Her story is tragic. I wanted to make a portrait that reflected that story. But she clearly didn’t. She posed the way she felt–a sexy young woman.

I photographed all 65 subjects using a Polaroid-type film on a large-format field camera. I made a deal with every subject: If they thought the photo put them in danger, they could destroy it. Having a physical photograph gave them this option.

Buje (not his real name) is gay. In December 2013 he was taken from his home in Nigeria by a vigilante group who beat him with electric cables. He was then held in prison for over 40 days. He made several appearances at the Sharia Court, and was lashed 15 times with a horsewhip. Sodomy is punishable by death under Sharia Law, but requires four witnesses. Read more of Buje’s story here.

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COBURN: What did you find personally challenging about working on this project?

ROBIN: Most of my work focuses on human rights issues. That means telling stories that sometimes powerful people don’t want told, and it means sharing the experiences of people who’ve been the victims of abuses. These people are often hard to find, reluctant to talk, petrified of being persecuted. Taking pictures is often a very small part of the work, at the end of a long process of finding the people and winning their trust. This work was no different.

Given the expense of the film, I’d sometimes only take three pictures. There was sometimes a huge amount of work just to take those three frames.

Trans man Mitch Yusmar, 47, is seen with his partner of 17 years, Lalita Abdullah, 39, and their adopted children, Izzy, 9, and Daniya, 3, at home outside Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. Their relationship is not legally recognized and they live with the insecurity that their family could be torn apart should something happen to Lalita, who is the only recognized parent. Read more of Mitch’s story here.

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COBURN: Did anything about working on this project surprise you?

ROBIN: I was surprised how visually literate many of the subjects were. They really got the power of imagery and how they were being portrayed. I think that is in part due to social media—we’re all gaining a greater fluency in the language of photography.

It’s also, I’m sure, partly because many of the people I worked with are very conscious of how they look, on one hand because it forms part of how they wish to be identified, and on the other, because how they look could give their identity away.

So many LGBT people in the world today feel they are alone. Or they are surrounded by people who tell them there is something wrong with them. Unfortunately they believe it.

Transgender woman Abinaya Jayaraman, 33. Her family rejected her gender identity and she took a cocktail of sleeping pills and pain killers in an attempt to end her life. She spent three months in the hospital, then was disowned and thrown out of the house. She now does sex work in Malaysia to get by.Read more of Abinaya’s story here.

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COBURN: What do you hope viewers will take away from seeing your images?

ROBIN: “Where Love Is Illegal” marks a change in my career. I’ve always wanted to do work that felt meaningful. And I’ve always hoped it makes a difference.

That’s why, with a small group of others, I created the nonprofit Witness Change, which was formed on the back of “Where Love Is Illegal.”

Our aim is to produce highly visual storytelling on seldom-addressed human rights abuses. We are creating projects that amplify the voices of those who have survived abuse, document the stories of those who have not, and endeavor to stand for the end of human rights violations for generations to come.

Simon, 22. He was arrested while having sex with his boyfriend in Uganda. They were beaten, dragged naked through the village, and thrown in jail with no medical treatment. They later escaped from a hospital when a doctor, who was Simon’s ex-boyfriend, took pity on them. Simon fled to the Ugandan capital of Kampala. He has not seen his boyfriend since. Read more of Simon’s story here.

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COBURN: What can viewers do to help if they are moved by your images?

ROBIN: Bigotry thrives where those discriminated against are silenced. The objective is to have the people in this project seen and their voices heard, and to raise money for grassroots LGBT organizations working in countries where being LGBT is illegal or subject to massive discrimination. So we ask everyone to share these stories and to donate to these organizations however they can.

“Miiro, 25 (left), and Imran, 21 (not his real name), are a gay couple living together in Uganda. The pair was evicted from their home, beaten, had all their possessions burned, and then were thrown in jail for being gay. Read more of Imran’s story here.

The word “taxidermy” originates from the Greek words taxi and derma and translates to “the arrangement of skin.” A traditional taxidermist will tan the animal’s hide, removing the flesh and cartilage to preserve the skin and fur, before draping it around a foam body made to look like the animal in real life. But artist Kate Clark does things differently.

Instead of fresh hides, she recycles old ones that are considered imperfect for the typical purposes of trophy mounts. Whether they were left too long in the freezer or bugs ate holes in the skin, she will stitch them together with care, before lopping off the foam animal head and replacing it with one made of clay, sculpted to have human features and then covered in the animal’s own facial skin.

This is not in an effort to create a creature from fantasy or nightmares, but rather to confront the viewer with mankind’s innate connection with the animal kingdom by evoking empathy, curiosity, and, sometimes, discomfort.

When I walked into her studio for the first time, I stared into each one of those animal’s humanlike eyes, fringed with the animal’s real eyelashes. I felt chills up my spine, but not from horror or disgust. These were hauntingly beautiful sculptures that combined two separate worlds: one from the plains of the savanna and the other from the clustered, dirty streets of New York City.

“In the Western World, humans are so separated that we have no reason to connect with [wild] animals anymore,” Kate says. “We have become so other.” In fact, she says that most people don’t even realize that she often changes the sex of the animals. Going through her sculptures you will see female faces with antlers attached—an appendage usually sported only by male animals. “Something as straightforward as that doesn’t even register, because our understanding of the natural world isn’t very good anymore,” she says.

Though Kate did not have a background in taxidermy before she started this art, she has spent a lot of time getting intimately acquainted with the hides. From spending three days removing thousands of dead ticks from the mane and genitals of gemsboks to learning which hides can tear like wet paper towel, she gets to know the life stories of the animals she works with.

“This greater kudu has a really beautiful claw mark on the side,” she said, referring to the photo below, “so an animal attacked him at some point and he survived. This one has what some might consider an imperfection, but to me makes it all the more interesting.”

Using cotton thread and dressmaker pins, Kate will stretch, stitch, and secure the animal hides in place on the foam form. But the faces also have rows and rows of pins tracing patterns around the human face.

“Some think it’s tribal, some think it’s just decorative,” she explained. “But I want that construction to be really visible. [Since] the stitching disappears, the pins reemphasize that this face is constructed. Even though you recognize it and believe it, I want the viewer to see clearly that it’s transformed from the animal into the human.”

That transformation from animal to human is what has her work being viewed all over the world. Those intense eyes, the serene facial expression, and the proud animal’s body consistently draw in people from all different races, religions, and languages. Some are aghast at her audacity to combine human and animal, but most are entranced and appreciative of the message she hopes to get across.

“It speaks to people,” Kate says. “Even if they don’t know what’s happening in the contemporary art world, they recognize themselves in the work. And that means a lot to me.”

Interested in taxidermy? See related photos and video featured in the July 2015 issue of National Geographic magazine.

]]>http://proof.nationalgeographic.com/2015/07/24/a-twist-on-taxidermy-blurs-the-boundaries-of-humanity/feed/18Ten Nat Geo Images That Look Incredibly Familiar … Here’s Whyhttp://proof.nationalgeographic.com/2015/07/21/ten-nat-geo-images-that-look-incredibly-familiar-heres-why/
http://proof.nationalgeographic.com/2015/07/21/ten-nat-geo-images-that-look-incredibly-familiar-heres-why/#commentsTue, 21 Jul 2015 14:55:20 +0000http://proof.nationalgeographic.com/?p=23369You may have seen these images before. At the dentist’s office, in the lobby of a law firm, or while you sit on your friend’s couch trying to agree on which movie to watch. As well as being popular stock photos, they are featured in the default screen saver for Apple TV—a device that allows you to stream content to your television. I don’t own one myself, but they are becoming increasingly common, and with them, so is this collection of stunning National Geographic images.
A video of National Geographic images featured in the default screensaver for Apple TV

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I wanted to share some tidbits about these photos, so you can impress your friends the next time you’re arguing over rom-com or sci-fi. And even if you’ve never seen this screen saver, you’ll still appreciate the photos. Here is a selection of ten of the featured images (there are 26 total), including links to the original National Geographic magazine stories they appeared in.

“Over thousands of years winds have sculpted sand in the Namib Desert into some of the world’s tallest dunes, colored red by iron oxide. The sand contains just enough moisture to sustain a few hardy plants. Not far from this dune, one called Big Daddy looms 1,200 feet above the desert floor.”

“Hunting for morsels of plankton, a school of spadefish hovers near the surface off Japan’s subtropical Bonin Islands. The turquoise color permeates the water late in the afternoon, as the red rays of the setting sun spread out and grow weak.”

***

Photograph by George Steinmetz, National Geographic Creative “A Sea of Dunes,” July 2010

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“Seen from the air, the dunes look like white linens hung out to dry on a windy afternoon. In fact, the name of this place, Lençóis Maranhenses, means the ‘bedsheets of Maranhão,’ the state in Brazil on the tropical northeastern coast where the half-moon-shaped dunes are found.” Here, “Ribbons of dunes trap the rains.”

***

Photograph by Paul Nicklen, National Geographic Creative “Life at the Edge,” June 2007

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“Its image mirrored in the icy water of the Arctic Ocean, a polar bear travels submerged—a tactic often used to surprise prey. Scientists fear global warming could drive bears to extinction sometime this century.”

“Concerned that the bears may be headed for extinction, officials at the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service recently proposed listing the bears as threatened under the federal Endangered Species Act. ‘There’s a really clear relationship between polar bear conditions and retreating sea ice,’ says Rosa Meehan, division chief for the service’s Marine Mammal Management Program. ‘Bears depend on ice. And the ice is melting.’”

***

Photograph by Michael Melford, National Geographic Creative “Boundless,” November 2011

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“A thunder cloud passes over the Middle Fork of the Salmon River in Salmon-Challis National Forest, Idaho.” The Wild and Scenic Rivers Act, passed in 1968, protects 104 miles of this river.

***

Photograph by Jözsef L. Szentpéteri, National Geographic Creative “Painting the Sky,” October 2008

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“The European bee-eater leads a colorful life on three continents.” Pictured here in Sarand, Hungary, “a hungry female bee-eater is not yet willing to mate. So the male bee-eater takes wing to find more food. When he returns, ‘the female nearly always accepts the offering, quickly eating,’ reports British ornithologist C. Hilary Fry. If his courtship is successful, he’ll continue to bring her prey through the egg-laying period. Both parents deliver meals to their chicks.”

“This is the other China. High in the mountains of Sichuan Province, in Jiuzhaigou Nature Reserve, rare plants and animals find sanctuary, and millions of visitors have discovered cool, clear, sapphire-and-emerald-tinted waters, far removed from the sooty industrial sprawl that consumes lands and lives below.” Here, “mist rolls over Five Colored Lake at dawn.”

“Needing fuel for his efforts, this silverback soaks in a swamp for hours, methodically stripping and rinsing dirt from herb roots before munching,” in the Congo Basin of central Africa.

Want to see more amazing photos taken by National Geographic photographers? National Geographic Creative licenses our photographers’ work around the world, creating more space for these images outside of the yellow border.

]]>http://proof.nationalgeographic.com/2015/07/21/ten-nat-geo-images-that-look-incredibly-familiar-heres-why/feed/19A Photographer Explores Sweden’s Secret Summer Campshttp://proof.nationalgeographic.com/2015/07/20/a-photographer-explores-swedens-secret-summer-camps/
http://proof.nationalgeographic.com/2015/07/20/a-photographer-explores-swedens-secret-summer-camps/#commentsMon, 20 Jul 2015 10:30:08 +0000http://proof.nationalgeographic.com/?p=23438Every summer in Sweden, abused women and their children are transported to an undisclosed location for three therapeutic days of lake swimming, music, and bonfire parties. According to photographer Åsa Sjöström, many of them immigrated to Sweden from places like Iran, Iraq, or Afghanistan and are now living in shelters to escape familial abuse, honor killing, or genital mutilation.

These women require the utmost protection, as any information about their whereabouts can be dangerous.

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The camps are lush and scenic, and the women’s stories are compelling, but how do you make a portrait of someone whose identity needs to remain hidden? Sjöström’s project “Secret Camps” captures the women and children at play while creatively obscuring their identities with balloons, hair, flowers, and veils.

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Given the tight security, Sjöström wanted to make sure her presence would not further endanger the women. “The first time I went to a camp I didn’t want to be told where we were going—I didn’t want to have that responsibility,” she says. “I wanted to go under the same circumstances as everyone else. We got on a bus and nobody knew where we were going. No one could have GPS turned on on their phones. We had no Facebook or Instagram. I was quite scared because I didn’t want any woman to be found because of my pictures.”

Unlike most summer camps, these campers were quite hesitant at first. Sjöström says,“Very few of them knew each other, and they were trying to sort out where they were. They were scared to go into the forest. They were isolated, and many of them didn’t really like it at first.”

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Sjöström knew she needed to ease into photographing. “The first day at the camp I hardly took any pictures. I wanted them to introduce me first. I had to know who didn’t want to be photographed. After that I started taking pictures very slowly—not snapping around all the time. This project was very different because when I saw a picture happening I had to go behind it, instead of in front of it.”

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“It was hard with the children in the beginning. They would say, ‘Why can’t we show our faces?’ It was quite heartbreaking. I had to explain it to them. After a while they understood and when they saw me coming they knew to cover their faces—like the girls with balloons.”

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As the camp progressed, the mood changed. “When the mothers saw that the children started playing with each other, they relaxed and started becoming happier,” Sjöström says. “They had a bonfire party in the evening, played music, dressed up, took off their veils and went swimming. Some had never been swimming in a lake before.”

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According to Sjöström, the contrast between the conditions at the shelters and camp life is quite stark. “When they’re crowded it’s really hard, especially when they bring all of their children and share a kitchen, share everything. Tensions can be really high at the shelters. These women are often in traumatic situations, they cry a lot, and some of them have never been outside of their apartments. Just the fact that they have escaped makes them vulnerable, and a lot of them go back to their husbands again because they are too scared to go back into society.”

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Sjöström says this project began as work for a commissioned book and later grew into a personal project. She had already built a reputation for covering women’s rights issues with Sweden’s International Women’s Rights Association, which made her a good fit for the project. It also helped that she herself is a woman—even the author of the book wasn’t allowed at the camps because he’s a man. All of his interviews for the book were conducted separately, away from the camps.

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As “Secret Camps” gets distributed more broadly, Sjöström says she hopes the summer camp concept will be adopted in other places. “The camps are truly amazing, so I hope more organizations start doing this,” she says. “It’s especially important for the children to get outside and play without thinking about hiding or their mothers crying all the time.”

View more of Åsa Sjöström’s work on her website, and send an email here to request the book Summer’s Sheerest Light, which includes Sjöström’s photographs of the camps and text written by Lars Åberg.

]]>http://proof.nationalgeographic.com/2015/07/20/a-photographer-explores-swedens-secret-summer-camps/feed/7The Love Between Mother and Child, in Photoshttp://proof.nationalgeographic.com/2015/07/17/the-love-between-mother-and-child-in-photos/
http://proof.nationalgeographic.com/2015/07/17/the-love-between-mother-and-child-in-photos/#commentsFri, 17 Jul 2015 14:44:09 +0000http://proof.nationalgeographic.com/?p=23378Twice a month our Your Shot community runs a photo assignment with a topic chosen by a guest editor. Our most recent assignment, Mother and Child, was imagined and curated by National Geographic contributing photographer Stephanie Sinclair, who’s known for her documentary work focusing on sensitive issues facing women and girls around the world.

***

For this set of Your Shot images, I wanted to visualize something visceral rather than literal. I began with this quote:

“[A] mother is one to whom you hurry when you are troubled.” —Emily Dickinson

Given the global reach of Your Shot, I wondered how the community might capture this idea visually.

As I looked through the images, intimacy, love, and strength were just a handful of the emotions that appeared. It was not the images alone that inspired me but the stories behind the photographs. Here are five photos from the final edit that stuck with me because of their visual strength and their narratives. —Stephanie Sinclair

One of the first images to catch my eye was by photographer Mohammed Yousef. Mohammed shared the story of Malaika, a well-known leopard in Kenya’s Masai Mara National Reserve. In his caption, Mohammed explains the protective expression and stance he captured as the mother stood over her cubs. “A lioness killed one of her cubs, [now] she is left with five.” Not only did this image have beautiful light and strong composition, but it also resonated so strongly with the quote I shared from Emily Dickinson.

The stunning portrait by Tracey Stevens is of a woman named Alex, who is eight months pregnant, delicately holding several broken eggs. Her caption reads, “The eggs cradled in her arms are representations of the eggs she lost and the babies she miscarried. There was both pleasure and pain while taking this photo, the pain of loss and the joy of a new life who is now a gorgeous full-of-life two-year-old.” I felt it important to show a less frequently photographed aspect of the mother and child relationship. Tracey’s depiction of infertility and loss is respectful and powerful.

Daniel Perlaky submitted a thought-provoking image of a moment between a mother and daughter living in Nepal. Daniel showed a sophisticated understanding of the decisive moment, looking not for peak action but instead for a subtle yet powerful instant. “This beautiful and honest moment completely captured my heart,” he writes in his caption. “They remained quietly like this for nearly a minute.” The farming family left their home to move to a smaller shack with a location that would allow their daughters to attend school.

Ankit Narang didn’t have to travel far from his home in Delhi to photograph an image for the Mother and Child assignment. As he explained, “[While] some laborers were working right below my house, I climbed up on my terrace and unexpectedly found … [a] mother … taking a nap with her daughter. Forced to work as a laborer due to lack of education and no other means left to make a living … they make the construction site their temporary home, moving from one place to another.” I loved that Ankit not only found a beautiful moment but also took the extra step of learning about this family, thereby making the image much more powerful.

For the final photograph, Cletus Nelson Nwadik wrote about his experience traveling to Nigeria after living many years abroad. “Academically girls are doing better than boys at schools in my village,” he said. “Boys [die] more than girls in their infancy … Without girls my village will perish. Girls have so [many] burdens on their shoulders. They sometimes hold the weight of the world on their shoulders. But girls [live] longer and often [are] not involved in drugs as much as boys … The future belongs to girls … Poverty and getting married at [an] early age are their biggest challenges …”

For more photographic interpretations of Mother and Child see the rest of the published story on Your Shot.

]]>http://proof.nationalgeographic.com/2015/07/17/the-love-between-mother-and-child-in-photos/feed/4Tracking Gandhi’s Ghost: A Sensory Tour Through Rural Indiahttp://proof.nationalgeographic.com/2015/07/15/tracking-gandhis-ghost-a-sensory-tour-through-rural-india/
http://proof.nationalgeographic.com/2015/07/15/tracking-gandhis-ghost-a-sensory-tour-through-rural-india/#commentsWed, 15 Jul 2015 14:09:41 +0000http://proof.nationalgeographic.com/?p=23309The whir of a cotton spinning wheel, the sung prayer of Dalit school children (once known as Untouchables), the cry of a newborn child—this is how photographer Rena Effendi transports us to India’s villages.
The city of Porbandar is the birthplace of Gandhi. Here, cows look out toward Porbandar port from the junction that leads to Mahatma Gandhi Road. Gandhi spent his early childhood here, strolling on this beach road on his way to the temple and library. All Photographs by Rena Effendi

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“India lives in her seven hundred thousand villages.”—Gandhi

For the July 2015 issue of National Geographic magazine, Effendi was tasked with telling the story of Gandhi’s lasting influence in contemporary India. She was asked to capture what she calls a “ghost story”—a tale with a main character who is no longer with us. So she decided to trace the route of his famous 1930 Salt March from his home base at Sabarmati Ashram near Ahmedabad to Dandi Beach, a 241-mile journey that peacefully protested an unjust British law banning salt collection within colonial India. The march helped to build momentum and support for India’s eventual independence in 1947.

Loyal to a dying craft, Pramod Shah spins cotton thread on an old-style wheel, or charkha, at his home in Bihar. Millions of Indians once made cloth by hand, inspired by Gandhi’s vision of spurning British goods and reviving village economies. The market for hand-spun cloth, or khadi, is small today, though staunch Gandhians wear it religiously.

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Along the route of the march, Gandhi stopped to speak with people in the villages. And so Effendi did the same, seeking his traces in the the landscape and the people and finding his influence in the rituals and lifestyles of those she met along the way. She and her assistant Oliver Saurabh Sinclair collected audio in many of the places she photographed, creating the video above and allowing us to not only see but also to hear the sounds of an artisan workshop or a celebration of Gandhi’s birthday. It’s not a plane ticket, but it is a quick trip to the richness of rural life in India.

Solidarity in the workplace spills over to the village well in Rasnol, Gujarat. It is one of thousands of places where the Self-Employed Women’s Association, a Gandhian trade union, has taken root. Its founder, Ela Bhatt, calls women ”the pillars of village society.”

You can also hear Rena Effendi speak about her experience photographing this assignment on Proof.

]]>http://proof.nationalgeographic.com/2015/07/15/tracking-gandhis-ghost-a-sensory-tour-through-rural-india/feed/11Portraits of Katrina: Seven Photos of Destruction and Resurrectionhttp://proof.nationalgeographic.com/2015/07/14/portraits-of-katrina-seven-photos-of-destruction-and-resurrection/
http://proof.nationalgeographic.com/2015/07/14/portraits-of-katrina-seven-photos-of-destruction-and-resurrection/#commentsTue, 14 Jul 2015 14:04:38 +0000http://proof.nationalgeographic.com/?p=23294On August 29, 2005, Hurricane Katrina slammed into the United States Gulf Coast and became one of the most devastating storms in the country’s history. Failed levees in New Orleans, along with poor preparation and a slow governmental response, would have repercussions for years to come. The city became a focus of human tragedy and triumph that riveted the world.

As part of our ongoing coverage of Katrina’s ten-year anniversary, we selected photographs that tell a story of resilience—from views of destruction made soon after the storm to present-day portraits showing the vitality of the Mardi Gras Indian and second-line parades. The photographers who made these images show us loss, renewal, and survival. They remind us that New Orleans, iconic as ever, is still thriving in a precarious landscape.

*****

September 2, 2005Photograph by Mario Tama, Getty Images

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I flew to New Orleans two days before the storm made landfall. The National Guard arrived in force on September 2 with aid from the outside and a convoy of trucks to distribute food, water, and supplies to those still at the convention center. This was the day the tide started to shift psychologically, as proper relief appeared. People had been stranded in the city for four or five days, many stuck in the Superdome or the convention center. The stench and heat were overwhelming and unforgettable. —Mario Tama

December 2005Photograph by Frank Relle

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After Katrina I would go out driving in New Orleans, where I was raised. In the complete darkness of a city without electricity, I found locations by using my headlights. Many of the street signs had been washed out, and I often became lost in my own city—a place made surreal by the hurricane and the mass exodus it had caused. Though I’ve searched many times for this grocery store, I haven’t been able to find it again, and so this photograph has become emblematic for me of the disorientation and displacement I felt after the storm. —Frank Relle

Photograph found May 2006Photograph by Will Steacy

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The first trip I made to New Orleans was six weeks after the flood. Nothing could prepare me for what it felt like to be there: the smell, the mud, the stale air, the heat, the mold, the pain, the sheer magnitude of it all. Everyone’s possessions were strewn about the streets. I kept seeing flood-damaged family photographs among all the debris. The faces in these pictures, peering up at me, stopped me in my tracks every time. Here was the evidence of people’s lives before the storm. I began photographing these altered snapshots as a way to tell the story of the people who weren’t there. —Will Steacy

September 2005Photograph by Robert Polidori

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Two weeks after the levees collapsed, New Orleans was deserted. While photographing each dwelling, I could imagine its residents. The pictures I took show traces of interrupted and discarded lives. Most of the people didn’t die but became refugees in their own country and from their own lives. They had to move on, either living someplace else or perhaps later coming back, but the life they used to live, surrounded by their objects of personal value, was gone forever. —Robert Polidori

April 2014Photograph by Charles Fréger

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Last year I made a series of portraits of Mardi Gras Indians from the different “tribes” in New Orleans. They are African Americans who, during Mardi Gras, wear heavily feathered costumes that reference traditional Native American dress. The organized groups are called tribes, and the members each have roles, including that of chief. I was interested in the history of this ritual, which some people believe stems from stories of Native Americans who sheltered escaped slaves. Many of the Mardi Gras Indians I photographed lived through Katrina. I tried to capture the resiliency of their mythology, their energy, and the intensity of their spirit. —Charles Fréger

December 2014Photograph by Tyrone Turner

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Photography has allowed me to understand New Orleans in a way I never did growing up there. Here, a bus takes participants from the Lower Ninth Ward to the start of the Big Nine Social Aid and Pleasure Club second-line parade. “Second line” refers to the dancers who follow the first line of musicians in a jazz parade. Social-aid and pleasure clubs have origins in the 19th-century African-American benevolent societies that helped pay health and burial costs for members. Post-Katrina, second-line parades served as places where dispersed people could reconnect, pass on information, and enjoy pride in their community again. —Tyrone Turner

May 2014Photograph by Stephen Wilkes, panorama composed of six images

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Almost nine years after Katrina, I made this image. My goal was to show how the architecture was being adapted for rising seas. The change from 2006 was dramatic: resilience and restoration in some areas, abandonment in others. The colorful new buildings were designed to withstand the next hundred-year storm. This project has made clear to me that we have decisions to make—and some will be easier than others. —Stephen Wilkes

Proof has been looking at how communities in and around New Orleans have healed in the ten years since Katrina. The first post, “Holding on to Heart and Soul in New Orleans’ Lower Ninth Ward,” is here.